The Courtship of Mr Cobb
by Keena
Summary: Jayne may not be a girl, but there are certain tricks to courtin' him and River is certain she's figured them out.Takes place after Serenity so spoilers for the movie.
1. The Cortex

Disclaimer- Joss owns all and I worship he almighty greatness at every full moon.

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Jayne wasn't sure why, but he couldn't get any gorram sleep. He pulled off his blanket and sat up with a grunt. Rubbing his eyes as he sat up he then looked for his knives. Cleanin' them would probably be the best way to spend his time. He couldn't lift no weights, that make too much noise and sides last time he did that Mal had him scrubbin' the bay for a week.

Jayne grabbed he knives and a rag and climbed outta his bunk tryin to make as little noise as possible. When he heard a girly moan comin from the front. Jayne looked around then slowly walked up the steps. He stopped at the top.

Gorramit if it wasn't the hottest thing he'd ever seen. There was Moon Brain sitting in the pilots chair watching dirty movies on the cortex.

"I don't understand," River said. Jayne jumped at the sound of her voice.

"They're nekkid, what's to understand?"

River turned to face Jayne, her eyes wide with confusion, "It's problematic. How is some of these positions plausible? Added into the pain factor- She cannot understand the pleasure. She can understand the necessity of procreation- It's imbedded within our genetic code. Some of these things just seem asinine and impractical."

Jayne looks over at the cortex at the dirty movie the girl was watchin'. There was some girl dressed up in animal furs being bent over by a guy wearing a tiny piece of fabric over his man bits. Jayne coughed and looks away.

"Girl, I think ya should turn that thing off and get to sleep," he grumbled.

"Can't sleep, it's not plausible. She needs to understand this."

"Shouldn't you be askin' your brother or Kaylee?" Jayne asked as he fidgeted with his knives.

River shook her head, "Not a possible concept. The two are practicing the acts that I wish to understand."

Jayne hears several moans and grunts from the cortex. He reaches over and shuts it off. "How'd ya find that stuff anyway? Aren't you busy keeping this boat in the air?"

"They were saved in a private file of the previous pilot. I did not mean to find them."

Jayne looks up at her, his eyes widened in surprise, "Wash had dirty movies on that thing?"

River nodded, "There were several that involved people living in prehistoric times. This seems implausible because the first biped sapiens did not exist until millions of years after the sudden mass extinction of the species."

He shifted from his left and right foot, "Crazy, it's not supposed to make sense, it's a movie."

River rolled her eyes, "I understand that. What I don't understand is the sexual aspects of these movies. I'm not a child- I know the difference between fantasies."

River leans forward, "Will you help the girl understand what girl parts and boy parts do together? This material is not cooperative."

Jayne looks away. He doubts she understands the way her pout is big eyes are making him feel. He looks down and sees her cleavage; she's pushing her breasts together with her arms to make em stand out.

"Look, I ain't gonna help you figure that out. Your own your own. Sides the cortex ain't the best way to be learnin' something like that."

"Something like what?" asks Mal. He's standing behind Jayne with his hands on his hips.

Jayne ignores Mal's question and looks down at River one last time, "I'll be in my bunk" he states before he leaves.

Least he'll have something else to polish sides his knives.


	2. Noodles

Jayne opened up a package of dried noodles and dropped it into a bowl. He poured boiling water over the bowl and let it sit. He turned around and jumped. The gorram crazy girl was standing behind him.

"Whatcha doin here Crazy?" he asked, looking over her head.

"Dried thin processed strips of protein with a chicken flavored broth," she answered.

Jayne looked over at his bowl of noodles, "Ya can't have any of my noodles dong ma?" River tilted her head in response.

"She does not require much sustenance to exist. Just the broth with suffice." There was a hungry look to her eyes, and Jayne got the feelin that this was about more than just the noodles.

"Shouldn't ya be lookin up dirty dino movies on the cortex?" Jayne asked.

"Now is not an appropriate time, the girl will be chastised if she is caught by the father figure for showing the natural curiosity," River responded as she slowly began to inch closer to the noodles. Jayne grabbed his bowl and a fork and moved over to the table. He sat down and started slurping his noodles. River followed him and sat across from Jayne. "That is not the proper way to consume cuisine of that nature."

Jayne stopped mid slurp and looked at her, he finished slurping up the noodles that were half in his mouth and swallowed them. "That so? Well, sorry I ain't no fancy core dandy like your brother, but I like slurping."

River's eyes danced with laughter as she suppressed a giggle, "Slurping is a form of respect, however your utensil is incorrect for your meal. That is what she meant."

Jayne looked down at his fork with an intense stare trying to figure out what was wrong with his fork. "Ya can't eat noodles with a spoon, they won't hold. Same with a knife."

"It isn't appropriate to eat noodles with a fork, they are designed to be eaten with these," she replies as she hands him a set of chopsticks.

"Girl, not even my mama could get me to eat with those things."

River reaches over with one hand and pulls the fork out of his grasp and replaced it with the chopsticks. "Now eat properly." She leaned forward looking at him with hopeful eyes. Jayne looked down at the chopsticks and frowned. He looks back up a River and tightened his grasp on the chopsticks. "Unless you do not possess the proper motor functions."

"I'll have you know that I'm very handy."

River raised her eyebrows, "So he has talented fingers, then he should be able to use the tool before him."

Jayne dropped his jaw along with the chopsticks he shifted in the chair. "Girl, I think you've been watching too many of those movies." River giggled in response as she leaned backwards.

Mal walked in and grabbed the noodles from Jayne; he sat down and started eating with a set of chopsticks, "River, why don't you go check up on that brother of yours. Make sure he's shiny, or if he needs any money for supplies when we land."

River stood up and looked at the noodles, and then she turned around and walked away. Mal slurped some noodles and watched her go. He leans in near Jayne and whispers, "I was looking through the cortex for some of Wash's contacts for a job, and I found a bunch of dirty movies. The kind with naked girls and dinosaurs." Jayne started chuckling, but it turned into laughter. "I know," said Mal, "It's kinda creepy. Makes a man wonder if he ever made Zoe dress up like that."

Jayne nodded in response, and hoped that Mal never figured out that it wasn't the first mate that he was thinking of dressed in a tiny strap of clothing.


	3. Benching

It wasn't night time, which was good because Jayne needed to think, and the best place for him to think was in the cargo bay while he was workin' out. Most of the crew wouldn't bother him while he was in the cargo bay on account of the noises he made while he was lifting weights. He didn't always make those noises, but it kept everyone away. Who knew that a girl who spent her entire time with a noisy engine would get frightened off by a few grunts and growls? It's not like he was a Reaver or anything.

Jayne lay back on the bench and prepared to lift the weight bar. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath; he started benching the weights and tried to focus. That gorram crazy girl was acting off around him. It wasn't her normal, "I can kill you with my brain" crazy way- she was acting crazier. The girl was going outta her way to get him to pay attention to her. Talkin' about things a core girl like her shouldn't know about. Maybe she was spending too much time with Kaylee and that's why she started talking about sexin'.

Jayne continued to bench the weights, with each push he tried to figure out what was goin' on with River. He heard some squeals coming from somewhere in the ship and then some shouting, but it was probably nothing for him to worry about. Maybe the moon brain actually started going back to her old crazy ways. That would solve his problem. Cuz he just couldn't get the images of her and sexin' outta his mind.

It wasn't right, she was driving him crazier than her with all of her talk about dirty movies and she started wearing her clothes tighter. She took to wrapping cloth around her waist really tight. She didn't look like a little girl lost in a woman's dress, now she had a figure. It was one of them obvious ones, but it was there. It was enough for a man to get a hold of, like if you held her you wouldn't have no bones poking ya. Thoughts like those led to Jayne thinking it wouldn't be so bad to be poking her.

And that wasn't the way that Jayne wanted to be thinkin'. He started benching the weights faster and harder, pushing away the thoughts of River and sexin'.

Gorram girl, it was all her fault, this was all her fault. She was probably doing it so then Mal would kick him off the boat. But Jayne wasn't about to give up his kitchen privileges for some girl- even if she had nice legs. Jayne wasn't much of a leg man now days, but his ma always teased him that he'd like to touch woman's legs when he was a baby. And those were legs that he wouldn't mind touchin'. Most of the whores he saw were too lazy to shave their legs, so Jayne avoided touching them, but a core girl like River would probably be proper and have everything nice and smooth to touch.

And there he was again, he refused to go to his bunk and deal with his thoughts of her legs. Shephard Book always kept telling him that in order to keep from thoughts about sex you need to find something else to occupy your mind so you can abstain. Jayne thought that was a crazy idea before, but he wasn't being tempted by a young girl then. And if workin' out didn't work, then Jayne figured he'd start taking up knitting or something, anything to keep away from thoughts about her eyes. They were big and sometimes they'd stare at him like a dog starin' at a bone.

And Jayne was back to bones. Next time they were planet side he was gonna pick up some stuff for knitting. Jayne heard the squealing and screaming coming closer now. He hoped she had enough sense to stay away from him.

He stayed on his back and continued to lift weights, he didn't want any trouble and the best way to stay out of it was to stay where he was. The noise was getting louder, but Jayne ignored it. Suddenly it was quiet and he felt someone was near him. The weight bar was above his chest when he looked up and saw the crazy girl looking at him curiously. She bent down a little and that's when Jayne noticed that she wasn't wearing any clothes. Her hair was pushed forward and it kinda covered her breasts, but that didn't change the fact that she was standing there butt naked in front of him. Jayne's arms let out and the weights dropped on his chest. He exhaled a breath of air out forcibly. That gorram girl started giggling at him.

"River, I think it's time you put your clothes on," Jayne heard Simon say. Or at least hi thought it was the doc. Everything was getting a little fuzzy and white, even the noise.

All of a sudden he heard a bunch of people talking at once to her.

"Little Albatross you know it ain't proper to be runnin' around my boat naked as a jail bird."

"River, come one, put on your stuff and we'll go play in the engine room."

Jayne struggled to catch his breath and shoved the weight bar off of him. The clang of the bar on the floor made everyone jump. Jayne rubbed his chest and sat up only to meet River's eyes.

"River, please put your clothes on before anything happens," Simon pleaded.

River tilted her head slightly, "They were itching and binding. The girl wanted to be free and not hide behind the curtains."

Jayne blinked, and River imitated him. Inara stepped behind her and placed a robe around her shoulders. "Come on River sweetheart. There's a time and a place to be without clothing and the cargo bay isn't one of those places." Inara tried to lead River away. The girl stopped and looked at Jayne and smiled, it wasn't much really. Everyone else probably missed it on account of being so distracted by her nakedness, but Jayne saw it.

Everyone left Jayne alone with his thoughts. His eyes widened with realization, "Hey! She's trying to seduction me!"

Yeah, he needed to take up knitting or needle point, cuz that girl was driving him crazy.


End file.
